ing, and ferocious fanaticism. He was ac- fore the chief and murdered in cold blood.' customed when he entered Mosul to throw The principal villages were destroyed; the a veil over his face that his sight might not churches pulled down. Nearly half the be polluted by Christians and other impuri- population perished; among them one, of ties in the city. This man was at the ear the Meleks, or princes, and the good priest of Beder Khan, urging him to resume his Kasha Budæa; the last, except Kasha inhuman devastations. Kana, of the pious and learned Nestorian clergy. Even after the tardy justice of the Porte was put forth to crush this remorseless barbarian-justice which was content, probably mollified by some golden arguments, with a sentence of exile to Candiathe locust devoured what the canker-worm had spared. Nur Ullah Bey, whom we remember Dr. Grant visiting in his castle of Jula Merk, and unhappily, as it turns out, restoring to health, fell on the few survivors who returned to their villages, and put them to the torture to discover their concealed treasures. Many died, the rest fled to Persia. This flourishing district,' sadly concludes Mr. Layard, 'was thus destroyed; and it will be long ere its cottages rise from their ruins, and the fruits of patient toil again clothe the sides of the valleys' (p. 239). Mr. Layard arrived in the country after the first dreadful invasion which had wasted the villages of the Tyari; everywhere he was received with the fondest enthusiasm ; the notion of his high rank only saved him, or rather, as we gather from his sly language, prevented him, to his disappointment, from sharing in the pleasing peril of being smothered in the embraces of the grateful girls. This they only ventured to do to his companion, the brother of the consul. For even here, it is gratifying to find, that English influence had been exerted in the better cause of humanity, as it had been before in the cause of knowledge. Sir Stratford Canning had prevailed on the Porte to send a Commissioner to Kurdistan to persuade Beder Khan to give up his prisoners; he had himself advanced even more potent arguments for their release, large sums of ransom-money from his own pock et. The third expedition of Mr. Layard led him among a still more remarkable people, Mr. Rassam, too, the English Consul, perhaps in their origin not only much older had clothed and maintained at his own ex- than the Nestorian form of Christianity, but pense not only the Nestorian Patriarch, even than Christianity itself. He is admitwho had taken refuge in Monsul, but many ted into the rites, almost into the inmost hundred Chaldeans who had escaped from sanctuary of that singular race, who bear the mountains. Mr. Layard therefore was the ill-omened name of Devil-worshippers. welcomed with universal joy; his own kind He is the first European, we believe, who treatment of the Chaldeans, whom he had has received almost unreserved communiemployed in his works, had no doubt in- cation as to the nature of their tenets; creased his popularity. The whole account though probably, from the ignorance of the of his intercourse with the priests and with Yezidis themselves, he has by no means the people is of singular interest; though solved the problem either of the date or the with one fatal drawback, the presentiment primal source of their curious doctrines. which we cannot but feel while we read How extraordinary the vitality even of the his pages, a presentiment sadly realised at wildest and strangest forms of religious bethe close of this chapter, that even then lief! Here are tribes proscribed for centutheir cup of misery was not full. The ries, almost perhaps for thousands of years, cruel Mohammedan was only waiting to wreak his fanatic fury on Tkhoma, a wild but romantic district, which he had as yet spared. Such a deep-rooted jealousy and hatred of their Christian neighbours seemed to have possessed not Beder Khan alone, pled upon, hunted down, driven from place but some other of the Kurdish chiefs, that to place by the Mussulmen, as being of Mr. Layard himself was in great danger-a those idolaters, the people without a Book, danger which, being as much superior to towards whom the Koran itself justifies or fool-hardiness as to fear, he escaped by his commands implacable enmity. Against the judgment and promptitude, and by showing Yezidis, even in the present day, the Moshimself as crafty, when necessary, as his lem rulers most religiously fulfil the premost cunning foes. But after Mr. Layard's cepts of their Scripture-making razzias departure the storm burst on the happy but among them, massacring the males, carrydevoted Tkhoma. The inhabitants made ing off the women, especially the female some resistance; an indiscriminate massacre children, into their harems. under the name most odious to all other religious creeds-hated and persecuted by the Christians, as, if not guilty of an older and more wicked belief, at least infected by the most detested heresy, Manicheism-tram That fanatic took place; the women were brought be- persecution, which accidental circumstances suddenly and fatally kindled against the tan Pasha had endeavoured-not from reliChaldean Christians, had been the wretched gious zeal, but in hope of plunder and exlot, time out of mind, of the Yezidis. To-action-to get the head or chief priest of wards the Christians the Korân contained the tribe into his power. Sheikh Nasr had more merciful texts-towards the Devil- time to escape the plot against him, and to worshippers none. Yet here are they sub-substitute in his place the second in authosisting in the nineteenth century-flourishing rity, who was carried a prisoner to the tribes, industrious tribes, cleanly beyond town.' The heroic substitute, in his devomost Asiatics--not found in one district alone, tion to his chief, bore torture and imprisonbut scattered over a wide circuit (some ment. He was released by the intervention have lately taken refuge from Mohammedan of Mr. Rassam, who advanced a considerpersecution under the Russian government able sum on the faith of the Yezidis, and in Georgia), celebrating publicly their reli- this sum was punctually repaid by them gious rights-with their sacred places and when they had reaped their harvest. The sacred orders and with the unviolated Yezidis were of course in as great delight at tombs of their sheikhs, their groves, and the recall of Keritli Oglou as the rest of the their temples. The manners of these tribes province. Mr. Rassam was unable to atare full of the frank, courteous, hospitable tend a solemn festival, when the disciples freedom of Asiatics-they are resolute sol- of their religion from the most distant diers in self-defence—and at least, not more quarters were to meet at their great holy given, in their best days, to marauding habits place, the tomb of Sheikh Adi-a mysterious than their neighbors, and only goaded to them personage, whose history, the period of his by the most cruel and unprovoked persecu- life, his title to saintly reverence, have now tion. Their morals, as far as transpires in become an inexplicable myth. Mr. Layard Mr. Layard's trustworthy account, are much was more lucky. He was received by Husabove those of the tribes around them-they sein, the chief, a youth of remarkable beauty, are grateful for kindness, and by no means, rich dress, and courteous manners. After at least as far as Mr. Layard experienced, breakfast he was left to his siesta, which and we may add some earlier travellers, was broken by a shrill cry of joy from the jealously uncommunicative with Franks. women's tents. The sheikh himself anTheir secret rites, as witnessed by Mr. Lay-nounced the joyful tidings of the birth of an ard, are by no means these midnight orgies heir, which had just taken place-an event which have earned for them the epithet of which he ascribed to the good fortune at'Cheregh Sonderan'-the extinguishers of tendant on the stranger's visit. The sheikh lights. The imputation of revolting practices and the whole tribe entreated him to bestow implied in this appellation is as little justifi- a name upon the infant. Notwithstanding,' ed, in all probability, as the same charges ad- says Mr. Layard, 'my respect and esteem vanced by the Heathens against the primi- for the Yezidis, I could not but admit that tive Christians-by the orthodox Christians there were some doubts as to the propriety almost indiscriminately against the Gnostic of their tenets and form of worship; and and Manichean sects. It is the same charge I was naturally anxious to ascertain the which all religions have incurred, which amount of responsibility which I might incur have been obliged to shroud their ceremo- in standing god-father to a Devil-worshipnies, for fear of persecutions, in night or in per's baby. Nothing more being meant secrecy. Fantastic as these rites of the than the choice of a name (baptism, one of Devil-worshippers may be, and instead of their rights, it seems, is performed by imcalm and sober worship, maddening to the mersion, at a later period), Mr. Layard, utmost physical excitement, they are, as far with his usual tact, suggested the name of as we can know, perfectly innocent. If the babe's grandfather Ali Bey, who was dangerous, considering into what, according held in high reverence in the tribe. The to some of the Fathers, the Agape had de- next day the festival began. Even Mr. Laygenerated in the third and fourth century-ard's practiced eye may have been someconsidering the Jumpers, the Shakers, and what dazzled by the singularity and beauty Revivals of modern days-considering what of the scene, or rather the succession has been ascribed to some Mohammedan of scenes, which he has described with sects at all events, if the worst has been such grace and liveliness. The contrast of now and then true, there may be grave this cool shady valley, in which stood the doubts in many minds as to the right of tomb of Sheikh Adi-the religious buildings throwing the first stone. Mr. Layard's invitation to the Festival of the Yezidis was another act of gratitude arising out of English humanity. The Cre which surrounded it-its groves and its fresh and flowing waters-with the sultry cellars of Mosul, and the burning plains of Nimroud-may have heightened his powers of enjoyment! The cordiality of his recep- [istic and amusing incident, which for a time tion opened his heart-but the living nature marred the general mirth, and threatened of the picture is the best guarantee of the to interrupt the kindly feeling between the artist's fidelity:Yezidis and the stranger. The dances had begun― rose, 'I sat till nearly mid-day with the assembly, at the door of the tomb. Sheikh Nasr then and I followed him into the outer court, which was filled by a busy crowd of pilgrims. In the recesses and on the ground were spread the stores of the travelling-merchants, who, on such occasions, repair to the valley. Many-coloured handkerchiefs and cotton stuffs hung from the branches of the trees; dried figs from the Sinjar, raisins from Amadiyah, dates from Busrah, and walnuts from the mountains, were displayed in heaps upon the pavement. Around these tempting treasures were gathered groups of boys and young girls. Men and women were engaged on all sides in animated conversation, and the hum of human voices was heard through the valley. All respectfully saluted the sheikh, and made way for us as we approached. We issued from the precincts of the principal building, and seated ourselves on the edge of a fountain built by the road-side, and at the end of the avenue of trees leading into the tomb. The slabs surrounding the basin are to some extent looked upon as sacred; and at this time only Sheikh Nasr, Hussein Bey, and myself, were permitted to place ourselves upon them. Even on other occasions the Yezidis are unwilling to see them polluted by Mussulmans, who usually choose this spot, well adapted for repose, to spread their carpets. The water of the fountain is carefully preserved from impurities, and is drunk by those who congregate in the valley. Women were now hastening to and fro with their pitchers, and making merry as they waited their turn to dip them into the reservoir. The principal sheikhs and cawals sat in a circle round the spring, and listened to the music of pipes and tambourines. 'I never beheld a more picturesque or animated scene. Long lines of pilgrims toiled up the avenue. There was the swarthy inhabitant of "I exclaimed, Every place from which a sight could be obtained of the dancers, was occupied by curious spectators. Even the branches above our heads were bending under the clusters of boys who had discovered that, from them, they could get a full view of what was going on below. The manœuvres of what was going on below. The manoeuvres of one of these urchins gave rise to a somewhat amusing incident, which illustrates He had the singular superstitions of this sect. forced himself to the very end of a weak bough, which was immediately above me, and threatened every moment to break under the weight. As I looked up I saw the impending danger, and made an effort, by an appeal to the chief, to avert it. "If that young sheitabout to use an epithet, generally given in the East to such adventurous youths; I checked myself immediately; but it was already too late; half the dreaded word had escaped. The effect was instantaneous; a look of horror seized those who were near enough to overhear me; it was quickly communicated to those beyond. The pleasant smile which usually played upon the fine features of the young bey gave way to a serious and angry expression. I lamented that I had thus unwillingly wounded the feelings of my hosts, and was at a loss to know how I could make atonement for my indiscretion--doubting whether an apology to the Evil principle or to the chief was expected. I endeavoured, however, to make them understand, without venturing upon any observations which might have brought me into greater difficulties, that I regretted what had passed; but it was some time ere the group resumed their composure, and indulged in their previous merriment.—p. 286. We must make room for the night-scene the Sinjar, with his long black locks, his pierc--and for Mr. Layard's certificate of its ing eye and regular features his white robes perfect innocence :— floating in the wind, and his unwieldy matchlock thrown over his shoulder. Then followed the 'As night advanced, those who had assembled more wealthy families of the Kochers-the wan--they must now have amounted to nearly five dering tribes who live in tents in the plains, and thousand persons-lighted torches, which they among the hills of ancient Adiabene; the men in carried with them as they wandered through the gay jackets and variegated turbans, with fantas-forest. The effect was magical; the varied tic arms in their girdles; the women richly clad groups could be faintly distinguished through in silk antaris; their hair, braided in many tress- the darkness; men hurrying to and fro; women, es, falling down their backs, and adorned with with their children, seated on the house-tops; wild flowers; their foreheads almost concealed and crowds gathering round the pedlars who exby gold and silver coins; and huge strings of posed their wares for sale in the court-yard. glass beads, coins, and engraved stones hanging Thousands of lights were reflected in the founround their necks. Next would appear a pov-tains and streams, glimmered amongst the foliage erty-stricken family from a village of the Mosul of the trees, and danced in the distance. district; the women clad in white, pale and care- was gazing on this extraordinary scene, the hum worn, bending under the weight of their children; of human voices was suddenly hushed, and a the men urging on the heavily-laden donkey. strain, solemn and melancholy, arose from the Similar groups descended from the hills. Re-valley. It resembled some majestic chant which peated discharges of fire-arms, and a well-known years before I had listened to in the cathedral of signal, announced to those below the arrival of every new party.'—pp. 283–285. As I a distant land. Music so pathetic and so sweet I had never before heard in the East. The voices of men and women were blended in harmony In the midst of this occurred a character- with the soft notes of many flutes. At measured intervals the song was broken by the loud crash touch of which might perhaps not be unof cymbals and tambourines; and those who becoming in the followers of a more true were without the precincts of the tomb then and holy faith-to the Arabic words for a joined in the melody. The same slow and solemn strain, occasion-curse and accursed. Satan in their theory, ally varied in the melody, lasted for nearly an which approaches that of Origen, is the hour; a part of it was called "Makam Azerat chief of the angelic host, now suffering Esau," or the Song of the Angel Jesus. It was punishment for rebellion against the Divine sung by the sheikhs, the cawals, and the wo-will-but to be hereafter admitted to pardon men; and occasionally by those without. I and restored to his high estate. He is could not catch the words; nor could I prevail called Melek Taous, King Peacock;__or upon any of those present to repeat them to me. They were in Arabic; and, as few of the Yezi- Melek el Kout, the mighty angel. The dis can speak or pronounce that language, they peacock, according to one account, is the were not intelligible even to the experienced ear symbol as well as the appellative of this inof Hodja Toma, who accompanied me. The effable being-no unfitting emblem of pride. tambourines, which were struck simultaneously, Manicheism naturally suggests itself as the only interrupted at intervals the song of the source of this awe for the Evil principle; priests. As the time quickened, they broke in but the Satan of the Yezidis seems to be more frequently. The chant gradually gave way the fallen archangel of the later Hebrew beto a lively melody, which, increasing in measure, was finally lost in a confusion of sounds. The lief, rather than the Zoroastrian and Persian tambourines were beaten with extraordinary en- Ahriman, the eternal rival and equal of Orergy; the flutes poured forth a rapid flood of muzd; he is no impersonation of Darkness notes; the voices were raised to their highest as opposed to Light. The Yezidis seem to pitch the men outside joined in the cry; whilst have none of the speculative hostility to the women made the rocks resound with the Matter, as the eternal principle of Evil, shrill tahlehl. The musicians, giving way to the which is the groundwork of Manicheism, excitement, threw their instruments into the air, and strained their limbs into every contortion, as it had been of all the Gnostic creeds. until they fell exhausted to the ground. I never Nor is the Evil principle the equal antagoheard a more frightful yell than that which rose nist of the Good. In all other respects in the valley. It was midnight. The time and their creed seems to be a wild and incoheplace were well suited to the occasion; and I rent fusion of various tenets, either borrowgazed with wonder upon the extraordinary scene ed from or forced upon them by other doaround me. Thus were probably celebrated ages minant religions around them. Mr. Layard ago the mysterious rites of the Corybantes when they met in some consecrated grove. I did not supposes the groundwork to be Sabianism, marvel that such wild ceremonies had given rise yet he does not describe them as paying esto those stories of unhallowed rites and obscene pecial reverence to the heavenly bodies, mysteries which have rendered the name of except perhaps to the Sun, under the name Yezidi an abomination in the East. Notwith- of Sheikh Shems. They have a temple standing the uncontrollable excitement which and oxen dedicated to that luminary; and appeared to prevail amongst all present, there kiss the place where his first beams fall. were no indecent gestures or unseemly cercmonies. When the musicians and singers were This, however, is pure Zoroastrianismexhausted, the noise suddenly died away; (we ought to note that the researches in the various groups resumed their previous Nineveh are in favour of the Chaldean oricheerfulness, and again wandered through the gin of that mysterious personage and his valley or seated themselves under the trees. faith). They worship towards the rising 'So far from Sheikh Adi being the scene of the orgies attributed to the Yezidis, the whole sun, and turn the feet of their dead to that Kubleh. They have the same reverence valley is held sacred; and no acts, such as the Jewish law has declared to be impure, are perfor fire-a still more peculiar mark of the mitted within the sacred precincts. No other Persian creed; they hold the colour blue than the high priest and the chiefs of the sect in abomination; are fond of white linen, are buried near the tomb. Many pilgrims take and in the cleanliness of their habits and off their shoes on approaching it, and go bare- their frequent ablutions, they also resemble footed as long as they remain in its vicinity. the Sabæans.' They reverence the Old pp. 290-293. Testament almost with Jewish zeal (a tenet It is this strange and awful reverence for absolutely inconsistent with Manicheism); the Evil Principle which is the peculiar they receive, but with less reverence, the tenet in the creed, and has given its odious Gospel and the Korân. Their notion of name to this ancient and singular people. our Saviour is the Mohammedan, except With them and old Lear alone the Prince that he was an angel, not a prophet; with of Darkness is a gentleman.' They will the Korân, they take the Docetic view of not endure the profane use of any word his person, and deny the reality of his sufwhich sounds like Sheitan, or Satan; and ferings. Their habits have nothing of the they have the same aversion-some slight asceticism of the Manichean sects; they do Now half appeared His hinder parts, then springs as broke from bonds, And rampant shakes his brinded mane; the ounce, not even keep the Mohammedan Ramazan ;, stretching out slab after slab, with the trothey fast three days only at the commence- phies of victory or the offerings of devotion; ment of the year, and even that is not of above all, the huge symbolic animals, the necessary obligation. Wednesday is their bulls or lions, sometimes slowly struggling holiday, on which the more devout fast; into light in their natural forms, sometimes but it is not kept with the rigour of a Sab-developing their human heads, their outbath. Under their Great Sheikh they have spread wings; their downward parts-in a hierarchy of four orders, and these offices their gigantic but just proportions-heaving are hereditary and descend to females. off, as it might seem, the encumbering They are-I. The Pirs or saints, who lead earth. So in Milton's noble description, if a holy life, intercede for the people, and are we add only the broad-horned bull to the supposed to cure diseases and insanity.-II. lion and the stagThe Sheikhs, dressed in white, with a band of red and yellow, perform the chief functions of the ceremonial, take charge of the offerings, and vend the relics.-III. The Cawals are the itinerant preachers, who go round to teach the doctrines of the sect, chant the hymns, and play on the flute and tambourine.-IV. The Fakirs, dressed in coarse dark cloth, perform the menial offices. We regret to say that the schoolmaster forms no part of the hierarchy. It is considered unlawful to learn to read or We can conceive indeed nothing more write. This legally established ignorance stirring, more absorbing, than, once certainly may well make us despair of ever solving in the right track, to work away in these the mystery as to the origin of the Yezidis. mines of ancient remains; to follow the The only chance would be by obtaining the lode, not after vulgar copper or iron or even sacred volume of their traditions, their more precious metals, but after the images hymns, and religious ceremonial. It is in of the kings of ancient days, the records Arabic, but carefully concealed from the and pictures of victories-of empires almost sight and touch of the profane. It might pre-historic; to uncover the monumental indeed, after all, be hardly more satisfac- inscriptions, in almost the oldest of written tory than the perplexing Codex Nasireus, characters, which at least have in our own the sacred book of the Sabæan Christians day partially surrendered their secrets to or so-called Christians of St. John. the inquisitive industry and sagacity of our The leopard, and the tiger-as the mole, Paradise Lost, vii. 263. We return to Nimroud.-Our limited Lassens and Rawlinsons; to disinter an space forces us to compress into a brief Asiatic Pompeii, not a small, if elegant, summary our account of the actual discov- provincial town, buried in the days of the eries on this prolific mound. But we Flavian Cæsars, but the life, the wars, the strongly recommend our reader to follow banquets, the state, the religion of the capiMr. Layard himself in the successive steps tal city of old Assyria; the great temple, in of his operation; to catch, as almost the which reigned, and perhaps were worshipcoldest and most unimaginative will do, the ped, sovereigns contemporaneous with the infection of his zeal, to enter into his elder Pharaohs, and whose names had anxieties and his hopes; to behold cham- reached the Greeks only by vague and unber after chamber, hall after hall, unfold certain tradition. themselves as it were from the bosom of Mr. Layard's sagacity acquired before the earth, and assume shape, dimensions, long a knowledge of the right mode of height; to watch the reliefs which line the working these antiquarian quarries. The walls gradually disclosing their forms; as confident certainty with which he at last the rubbish clears away, the siege, and the proceeded, the sort of divination which he battle, and the hunting-piece becoming more seemed to possess, that intuitive magical and more distinct; the king rearing more rod which pointed to hidden curiosities, manifestly his lofty tiara, and displaying his was no less amazing to his perplexed undoubted symbol of royalty; the attitude fellow-labourers, than his motive in conof the priest proclaiming his office, some- suming so much cost and time in what aptimes his form and features, his imperfect peared such unprofitable labours. This and effeminate manhood; the walls of the simple plan of discovery at which Mr. besieged cities rearing their battlements, the Layard at length arrived, the knowledge of combatants grappling in mortal struggle; which may spare great waste of trouble and the horses curveting; the long procession money in future researches, was grounded |